


Peace

by LilyRosetheDreamer



Series: Journey [4]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Death of an OC, Gen, Grief, a lot of trauma here, the final stage to Hanzo's journey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-23
Updated: 2016-07-23
Packaged: 2018-07-26 03:39:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7558690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LilyRosetheDreamer/pseuds/LilyRosetheDreamer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The past shows up for a final reminder and Hanzo must summon all of his strength to deal with it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Peace

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! I was really surprised and overwhelmed by the positive response to my previous Hanzo one shot! So I’ll present this sequel. I don’t think there’ll be any more after this one, as hopefully Hanzo will have come to his conclusion. Please enjoy.

_(Their mother has three red dragons tattooed on her back._

_Hanzo runs his little hands on her skin, feeling the living, breathing dragon thrumming under his fingers and he giggles when she pulls him into her lap (he didn’t mind touch so much back then) and tells him that she can see his dragons too._

_That was long ago._

_He hasn’t seen her for years.)_

* * *

 

“Ah, Genji, there you are,” Zenyatta’s voice breaks through their meditation and Hanzo slowly exhales and opens his dark eyes, The room feels less…heavy than when he stumbled in at five o’clock this morning, hands trembling against his chest and lungs shrinking, collapsing. 

Zenyatta knew then what was best.

As he knows now.

Genji is too silent, too wrong and Hanzo feels a shiver creep calmly with long, rotting fingers down his spine. 

“I will leave you both for a moment,” comes the soothing voice of the Omnic as he floats from the room. Hanzo has been making progress and this seems to satisfy Zenyatta.

Hanzo remains seated where he is, unable to look away as Genji removes his face plate and kneels front of him. His mouth is drier than parchment and he can still barely meet his little brother’s tawny eyes. The scarred face is too real, too close.

“I went back to Hanamura the other day,”

“For a mission,” Hanzo says quietly, his gaze flitting between his hands and Genji. 

“Yes,” the younger Shimada replies. He pauses, as if weighing what to say and how to say it and Hanzo’s already hunching inwards. 

He doesn’t want to hear, to see, to be aware. 

Genji only talks like this when something’s gone wrong, because he’s a green-haired whirlwind -.

No.

That was the past. 

Genji is different now.

But old habits die hard anyway. 

“There has been word among the Shimada,” Genji continues gently, his hands reaching out to take one of Hanzo’s. 

The metal there is warmer than Hanzo remembers. Genji’s hands were always so COLD.

His hand lies limply within the grasp and Genji squeezes it. 

“Mother’s dying, Hanzo,”

The whisper hits a stone wall and shatters it like a stained glass window. Hanzo stares blankly ahead and doesn’t resist when Genji draws closer and leans his head on his bare shoulder.

* * *

 

He’s leaving Overwatch to take care of her. 

Hanzo would prefer to leave Genji a note and slip away in the shadow of night. But that would not be responsible - and Hanzo does owe the people of Overwatch. Bastion too will be saddened if he does not get a goodbye.

So he goes to Winston and Ana. 

Ana, who has started to become a grandmother and a safe haven as well.

Hanzo should be terrified at how close he’s getting to all of them.

He is.

And he isn’t.

“I must leave for a while for…personal matters,” he says stiffly, respectfully bowing at the waist. “I thought it prudent to tell you, so you would not - ,”

Not what?

Worry?

Ana considers him with a warm amber eye while Winston opens up a program on the computer. 

“Take all the time you need, Hanzo,” Ana replies eventually as the gorilla beside her makes the necessary adjustments to the schedule. “Family is one of the most important things you can have,”

Hanzo wants to tell her how scared he is.

He _yearns_  to tell her that he doesn’t know how to be a Shimada anymore.

He doesn’t.

Hanzo lets her pat his shoulder with a rod-straight back and tries not to think of all the reasons why he should stay instead.

* * *

 

He arrives in Hanamura on a pleasant Thursday afternoon, when the sky sends white cotton balls drifting lazily down its blue river and dusky cherry blossoms speckle the landscape. Hanzo continues to look over his shoulder, continues to watch every shaded alley and clutches the paper with directions from Genji (he’d known Hanzo would go, despite the risks) in a death grip.

He hasn’t seen her since -,

Since…

He finds himself short of air and wheezing out of sight as he tries to pull himself together. The black-haired archer closes his eyes and grounds himself through his feet, the way Zenyatta has been teaching him. After a few moments, he continues, though the world still swirls and tilts. 

She’s in a comfortable, simple place, with a decking for sipping tea. He wonders how much of that she’s done. 

A woman he doesn’t know opens the door and his throat seizes up. Despite this, he manages to tell her who he is anyway. She raises a scornful brow, but lets him in.

He hasn’t been near her in years and he’s only just turned up out of the blue as she’s dying.

Hanzo must look a very selfish son.

He is.

( “ _Selflessness is a virtue for this family,” his father says sternly. “You must cast aside your ties to advance us,”_

_The elder is behind him with a branding hand on his shoulder, Genji is peeking from Mother’s skirt and she has never seemed so proud._

_Hanzo is trapped._ )

* * *

 

Hanzo stands with the presence of a statue at the foot of her bed. He can’t relax, not yet, not now.

“Mother,” he exhales and her tired stare is full of terrible disappointment. 

“You’re not Genji,” she breathes out sadly and she as might as well slap him to complete it, to complete the pain. She might be losing her reality however. 

“No,” he whispers back, his hands clenched into fists. “I am Hanzo,”

“I know,” she answers, tears welling up and no forgiveness there. “You killed him, Hanzo,”

His mother cuts him open and he bleeds silently on the floor in front of her. 

“I-I need to take care of you,” Hanzo chokes out and his mother rolls on to her side, a crimson dragon peering over her frail shoulder. “It is my duty,”

The nothing lingers between them, stifling. If she were able to use the three dragons as she once could, she probably would.

“Then do your duty, Hanzo Shimada,” his mother scoffs in exhaustion. “As you always have done,”

Hanzo does.

And he **hurts**. 

* * *

 

There are smudges under Hanzo’s eyes. He can sense Genji’s gaze whenever he helps her to the toilet, whenever he cleans the house from top to bottom, whenever he gives her the food he remembers she used to enjoy.

He dismissed the girl a while ago. He needs no help, must not accept it, for his mother deserves the best care possible.

Deserves to see his redemption, his toil. Maybe THEN she would love him again.

She has fits sometimes and Hanzo does his best to accommodate her, to follow the advice of the doctor. She cries for Genji during the night and Hanzo holds her hand, for that is all she will allow (and that was too was a struggle). He works steadily with little sleep to take care of her as she wastes away. 

Everything he does is just shy of good enough and the simple answer that she never gives aloud is that he’s not Genji. He’s not the darling that he nearly murdered. His mother knows nothing about the events surrounding Genji and Hanzo is uncertain whether telling her would kill her prematurely. 

Hanzo must accept that.

If he could see Genji’s face as the little brother watches over them both from a distance, he would be shocked at the anger there. 

Their mother has always been selfish and Hanzo never saw it, too caught in his fervent desire to please.

Genji watches and doesn’t reveal himself, partly out of respect for Hanzo and maybe partly out of spite for their mother. Zenyatta will be most displeased to hear of such regression into his old anger.

Hanzo works and eventually stops sleeping at night. 

* * *

 

The time has come.

Hanzo’s somehow survived with one or two naps a day and he’s burning, swaying on his knees by her death bed with her brittle hand clasped against his forehead. She stirs fretfully, her chest rising and falling irregularly. 

“If only…Genji were here,” she murmurs blindly and Hanzo doesn’t respond, lost in oncoming grief and his old friend regret. 

Maybe the bridge would not be ashes in the water now if he had worked to rebuild it. Instead, he let his fear and inner storm consume him and now…there is nothing left. Nothing that she wants to give.

“Hanzo,” she breathes out slowly. “I wish it had been you instead of Genji,”

The rambling delusions of a dying old woman - and it impales him as though it were one of his honing arrows. The stepping stones to the last piece of his former life are all crumbling away, leaving him stranded. 

“I…wish that too,” he rasps. 

Someone comes to kneel beside him and Hanzo can’t stop the little sob of relief. 

“Genji,”

Their mother’s hazed gaze widen at the sight of those familiar tawny eyes. 

“Genji!” she gasps out, tears starting to stream down her face. “My small Genji,”

If she is taken aback by his new body, she does not show it. In fact, she appears to be ignoring it altogether in favour of reaching out for his ruined cheek.

“My green dragon, come to take me away,”

Genji allows this contact and he places a hand in her hair. Hanzo can barely see this.

“Mother,” he intones carefully, the other hand resting on his brother’s slumped shoulder. “I have forgiven Hanzo. Surely it’s time you should as well before you move on. Don’t leave him like this,”

She’s not listening, unable to listen as her lips move soundlessly, her hand tracing his face with all the love she used to show Hanzo as well. 

“Genji,” she gasps out suddenly, her body shivering with one final attempt to keep her alive. “I’m so happy to see you again,”

Tiny red lights seep from beneath her as the three dragons die with their holder and Hanzo presses his face into her translucent skin. She’s gone and there’s no more to beg for, no more to show her. 

Genji takes his hand away and fully wraps his arms around Hanzo.

“I tried, Hanzo,” he admits, shamed that he stole what could have been and Hanzo’s eyes are curiously dry. He’s not sure why he’s so numb and dizzy.

“It’s alright. I can arrange her funeral now,”

Genji’s clearly concerned, but it’s alright. Hanzo can continue to fulfill his duties to her for a while longer.

It’s only when he collapses by her grave stone (placed next to Father in just the way she wanted), spent and feverish that he’s finally able to rest. 

He sleeps for a solid four days and Genji calmly deals with her possessions and arranges for them both to return to Overwatch.

* * *

 

Hanzo is a wraith, wandering aimlessly around the base and going through the motions of battle. His quality has not diminished, but nor is it the same and they’ve all noticed. 

Hanzo is dealing with it, he truly is. Zenyatta’s kind concern is unfounded, but welcome and Bastion’s beeping attention keeps him moving and distracted. Tracer tries to chat to him, but Hanzo finds that he cannot handle her like he was starting to before he left. 

Lucio leaves him beautiful music with the flowers Bastion drops outside his door and Hanzo listens to it throughout the night. Sleep is hard and he does not want to deal with the screaming grief in his dreams that sounds all too much like his mother.

Ana and Mercy both corner him, Soldier 76 skulking in the background. 

“Hanzo,” Mercy pleads as Ana laces her fingers together under her chin at the table. “You must stop this, please! We really don’t mind you talking to any of us. This isn’t healthy for you,”

Hanzo’s fine. 

He doesn’t know what they’re talking about. 

( _Hanzo is pretty good at denial by the time he’s thirteen. Genji questions everything and scowls at the parroted lines of duty and honour and asks him always if he is well. Hanzo smiles and denies and pretends that he’s not sinking._ )

* * *

 

Hanzo drops a glass vase of dead flowers.

They lie scattered and brown and wet on the wood and there’s something so oddly and incredibly funny about this. He, a supposedly graceful archer, dropping things in a clumsy fashion. Something snaps inside his brain and Hanzo starts laughing, a high, hysterical LOUD laugh that vibrates through to his core and bounces off the plain white walls. 

He’s still laughing when Hana of all people rushes in with wide eyes and asks if he’s alright and he’s sniggering like a two year old when she comes back with Genji, Zenyatta trailing behind. Genji crouches down to where Hanzo is sputtering on his knees and hesitantly reaches out. 

“I-I dropped it!” Hanzo giggles. “I dropped something, isn’t that ridiculous, Genji?”

Genji wraps an arm around his shoulders and pulls him in close and secure when his desperate laughter turns to rattling, aching sobbing. He clings and can’t stop and he’s suddenly terrified that he never will. 

Hanzo isn’t alright.

It’s all seeping out of his cracks and Hanzo can’t stop any of it anymore.

* * *

 

It’s a long, arduous path after that. Hanzo often feels as though he’s riding a roller coaster, despite being withdrawn on the outside. Zenyatta does wonderful work with his mental well-being, unraveling his pain and anger and self-loathing like red string. Genji and Bastion are firm rocks to center him and he receives unconditional support in varying degrees from the other members.

After the first month, Hanzo can smile again. 

After a year…he realises that Overwatch is his family now, a blanket of love and security he never thought he’d feel. 

Finally, FINALLY, Hanzo can truly say he’s moving on. And that’s slightly frightening and exhilarating at once. 

He muses over this as he carefully turns the sunflower over in his hand. 

“We must be leaving soon, brother,”

Genji’s voice breaks him out of it and he nods, carefully placing the flower down over his mother’s grave. A hand smooths over the well-cared for marble and Hanzo Shimada smiles in response to Genji’s questioning countenance. 

“I am alright,”

And he is.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, everyone! I hope this was a satisfying conclusion and I’m thankful for the support and kindness. And yeah, I kind of head canon that the boys got their dragon abilities from their mother and father. See you all soon!


End file.
